UP HOUSE change to #7

Hi there! I finally got to putting another little house together, and found that uhhhh yeah... #7 is a piece of work! I have no idea how I ever got it to work the first time around, but I'll show you what I did to fix it.

First: I snipped the whole thing in half, like so. And then made a little slice on the bottom left piece (if you look closely you can see it).

Then I slid it right into place.

The other piece I glued to the inside, just on the scalloped edge along the bottom so it leaves room to slide the roof between the siding and the #7 roof pieces. It should look something like this:

And then all you have to do is put the roof on, it's not perfect (nothing about this little house IS perfect, I'm not a professional-anything, but it's still cute all the same!)

I hope that clears things up, and I'm SO sorry for the confusion/frustration. That really did not work the way it was supposed to:) 

The Lord Gave Me a Temple- Cheat Sheet

If I Listen With My Heart 2nd and 3rd Verses

 With these, I cut out each picture individually. During primary, I call up a child to removed 1-2 pictures (depending on how much time is left) every time we sing through it, until there are no pictures left. The pink is the 2nd verse, and the blue is the 3rd. (Sorry if they're out of order at all, I'm SUUUPER tired!) Sometimes just to make things interesting, we draw an "action" stick, too. 

Fourth of July Punch Board meets Balloon Toss (SO MUCH FUN!)

Alright. I wanted to test this one out before sharing my idea with the world. It ended up being a huge hit, so here goes. It started out as a traditional punch board, but I hot glued some of those confetti poppers to the inside of the cup, and they gave a nice "pop" once you pulled the string. We sang a patriotic song if the kids chose that one. 

I got 18-inch balloons from Target... they're HUGE and so fun! 

Rules to the balloon game: If the balloon hits the ground OR if someone grabs it/holds onto it, you have to start the song aaalll the way over! It gets a little rowdy, so another rule I made was once it hit the ground or someone held onto it, the balloon came back to me and everyone had to be in their seats quietly before we could start again. I'd like to hear how it goes for someone else, if someone decides to use it:)

As a disclaimer, I will never use tissue paper again. I'll use dollar store wrapping paper instead (plus our dollar store carries foam board, win-win!)

Father's Day POP the Noses

I saw this idea on the Primary Chorister Facebook page. BRILLIANT! I drew my own versions, and my daughter drew some of her own, too:) It was a fun project! 

I glued 6 faces to a poster board, made slits at nose-level with an exacto knife and then pulled the tied end of each balloon through them. I used water balloons and put song names (and a few "you choose's) on little slips of paper and bam, just pop the noses with a pin for lots of fun.

My Country 'tis of Thee (Cheat Sheet)

If I Listen With My Heart (Cheat Sheet)

1st verse:

2nd and 3rd coming soon!

I Will Follow God's Plan (Cheat Sheet)

1st verse:

Chorus:

The Sing-Ometer

I started using these to gauge the kids' progress on each song for the program. I cut them out, laminated them, and then used brads to tack the arrow to the gauge. Then you can use a dry erase marker to write the song in the blue box, and if they got EVERY song in the green zone, I gave them Lifesaver mints (because you can get a giant bag at Costco). The Senior Primary kids took turns coming up to move the arrow, and they did a good job of being honest. One girl even put it down in the orange because not everyone was singing! Something I didn't even catch;) Clever kids!

Aaaand.... ACTION!

The ghost is the bane of my existence. But these come in handy:)

Get the Cheese!

For this one, I cut out all of the food, the mouse, all of it individually and glued it onto a small(ish) sized foam board. You'll need 8 strong magnets for the best results. Hot glue two to the mouse body, two to the cheese, and then make "handles" for the backside of the foamboard using two magnets and small pieces of cardboard, so you can easily move the mouse toward the cheese! (My two-year-old son was manning the mouse in the video) :) Enjoy!

Make Yo' Mamma Cry!

I printed her on cardstock and laminated it. I then carefully painted black liquid watercolor on her eyelashes and let it dry. Then you let the kids loose with a spray bottle (have lots of paper towels on hand!) and make her cry tears of joy! Be sure to paint on her "mascara" the day of, otherwise it'll be a less dramatic of a raccoon-face run!

Bubble Gum Bianca

This cutie will steal the hearts of your primary! Simply print her out on three separate pieces of paper, cut around her, and assemble her onto a large foam board. Then carefully cut a hole at the center of her lips, large enough to where a pink balloon can be inserted and blown up easily. The better and louder they sing, the bigger the balloon gets! If the children sing well enough, we pop the balloon with a push-pin and the kids go wild!

Jello Sour Gummies!

This recipe is adapted from http://www.abeautifulmess.com/2015/04/make-your-own-gummy-candy.html

Gummies:

1 3-ounce package Jello

1/3 cup water

1 1/2 packets gelatin

1 packet Kool-aid in similar flavor

1 Tbs corn starch + 1 Tbs water

Coating:

1/2 cup sugar

1 1/4 tsp citric acid

Mix water, gelatin and Jello, stir briskly. Add Kool-aid and once again, stir briskly. Let stand for 5-10 minutes (till very thick).

Add the corn starch/water mixture, transfer to a heavy duty saucepan and bring to a boil over medium-high heat, stirring constantly. Boil for 1 minute, don't stop stirring!

Pour into molds while still hot and refrigerate for 20+ minutes. (Overnight doesn't hurt!) I used a medicine dropper to fill these particular molds, 5 ml filled them perfectly and it prevented a mess. 

I got these two candy molds at Joann's for about $3.25.

Once the gummies have set up, peel them away from the molds and plop them into a bag with the citric acid/granulated sugar mixture and shake-a-shake it till they're completely coated. They'll look super pretty... for a while. I'm still trying to figure out why this happens, but after a few hours, they start to sweat and the sugar starts to clump from the moisture. If I find a solution, I will share it:) As far as consistency goes though... this recipe is almost perfect. Not too rubbery, just the right amount of chew, a distinct, tangy flavor and the citric acid adds a nice sour punch. But if you don't really care for sour candies, just enjoy them plain:)

Above: Peach Watermelon sour gummies. I doubled this recipe and did one package of Watermelon Jello and one package of Peach Jello. Amazing.

Above: Grape.

Happy candy making!

Mama Mantra

To hang up in my daughter's bathroom... This is all the reminder she should need;)

Up House Clarification #1

This is in response to Ms. R's query! I hope it helps:)

First off, there needs to be two bends on this piece. Straight across from where the blue siding ends on each side. (I purposefully did NOT make a crease line, because I didn't like the look of a black line through the fish scale siding, but it's kind of a necessary step!) And another bend on the top line of the white siding.

The second error I made is this: there should be a crease line like so: (I penciled it in).

Then bend it under.

And this is how they fit together:

Once it's all glued together, it covers up that would-be gap very nicely. So sorry for the discrepancies! Hopefully sooner than later, my goal is to make an instructional video for the entire house. Thanks so much for visiting my blog!

Della Bean

Drippety Drop

Check out my VERY first gif! Slow as molasses, but hey! It was a lot of fun:)

Bridal Shower Games!

For my best friend's bridal shower, I found some cute games and activities via Pinterest and made them my own. This was way too much fun to do! The first game is "find the groom".  It's super simple, but fun when everyone's pulling out their celebrity and comparing quotes. Grumpy Cat and Robert Downey Jr. are my favorites:) 

How to Play: Each guest is handed a sealed envelope. Have everyone open their envelope, and whoever has the groom wins a prize.

The second activity are some fun mad-libs! (The blue one is my favorite). Everyone fills out the sheet on the right, and then fills in the blanks because it's just funnier that way, and makes it so people can't cheat! The best mad-lib wins!

The third game we played was a little different take on the "Toilet Paper Bride". It's called the "WHITE TRASH BRIDE". The guests are split into two teams, each team chooses a bride to dress up, and using an assortment of white trash that's in the boxes you supply, go to work! What I put in my boxes:

White duct tape. Q-tips. Twisty ties. Lots of tissue paper. Cotton balls. Tinsel. Toilet Paper. Hair bands (from the dollar store). 

It was SO fun to see what everyone came up with!